stick fast fleas

Penola Poultry · **Posted:** Sun Aug 24, 2008 5:42 pm

hello, does anyone have a pic of what stick fast fleas look like....or can you explain what they look like. Curious. Cheers, Darryl

bunyanuternie · **Joined:** Wed Jul 11, 2007 10:31 pm **Posts:** 2903

They look like fleas but they don't move , They stick to the Eyes and comb mainly , so you will see a patch of black little insects directly above the eyes mainly ,in crested fowl they tend to congregate in the crest . They are evil nasty little critters that need to be dealt with immediately , I can remember as a Kid we would get an out break for no apparent reason , and the whole lot would get dunked , Even if you quarantine your new arrivals you may still get them as they are carried by chuffs , Happy families , or noisy miners , or whatever you wish to call them , I don't have them (touch wood) but all breeders need to be very vigilant when it comes to stick fast fleas . I find a pour on insecticide better for insect control than Dunking myself . but thats only my opinion .

Lou · **Joined:** Mon Nov 19, 2007 11:12 am **Posts:** 387

What Ian said is totally correct & once you get them they are the worst things to try & get rid of.They are the size of a small normal flea & attach like a tick but in large numbers so it's like a patch of brown.

I have come a cross them when I was doing the dog hydrobathing & the only way to get them off is to treat the area they are on. Frontline & advantage products would only move a couple so you had to use a strong dip product.

There was poultry at the Dalby auction that had stick fast fleas on them :shock:

, always pays to take something to spray or dab if you are buying

Penola Poultry · **Posted:** Sun Aug 24, 2008 7:01 pm

mmmm don't think thats what i have then. I have an extremely old orpington bantam hen and she has been scratching her eyes a lot. There are 2 small lumps on the eyelid but they look nothing like fleas or ticks...they look like tumors??????? Poor old thing.

greenaus · **Posted:** Sun Aug 24, 2008 8:06 pm

I don't want to reveal all my problems, but I've had some eye troubles go through my pen of young 'uns in recent weeks.

Everything from bulging eye lids to bubbly eyes.

I thought it was due to the windy days and nights blowing some kind of irritant/s into their eyes.

I put one girl down last week who had both eyes bulging. Nothing like I saw on my South Burnett Poultry Tour a few months back and most would have kept her safe until she got better. But, I don't have time for sick chooks right now. It's good health (or minor problem with potential for speedy recovery without intervention) or the chop.

Is it a bulging (perhaps liquid filled) mass or a solid mass (a tumour like you said)?

Egglive · **Joined:** Fri Dec 14, 2007 10:58 am **Posts:** 267

Don't worry about revealing problems. Everyone's had them. It's all about how the problems are handled. I don't like to be the bearer of bad tidings, but it sounds like something I had a while ago. Very bad. Sometimes the eyes were unaffected just a bit puffy, sometimes bubbly, sometimes swelling with hard pus. Also occasional coughing, sneezing, but sometimes none of that just the eye.
Does this ring any bells?

If you can move the hard waxy pus sometimes you get something like this:

(Sorry if this many pics aren't allowed here - just delete them if that's the case - they are linked from photobucket & I'm hoping that's not too bad for your server!)

My recommendation if you've got this is cull, cull, cull. Sorry, it's just that I've tried everything. I've crop fed for weeks and weeks and kept them nourished. I've put them inside and kept them in the kitchen (phew!). I've given some of them antibiotics (not injectable though - not enough money). I tried to see what survived on its own and I found that a lot did get through it, but they never thrived and were extremely slow growing. In the end I gave up, culled - depopulated the pen, limed & scrubbed everything that had contact. That worked - go for that!

On the positive side - it seemed to spread by contact with the birds, not really by air. Birds in the contaminated pen got it, but birds on other parts of my block never did and are perfectly healthy. That's something to be grateful for. Also, the younger birds were more vulnerable.

I was very reluctant to go that far to get rid of it but I am so glad I did. Everything on my block is healthy - no resp, no cocci - nothing. Everything grows quicker for less food & I can be confident when putting out the littlies.

Good luck with your problem, maybe it's different, this is just my story of woe over the Autumn. It sounds like your problem is much more minor - I hope so. Good luck.

greenaus · **Posted:** Mon Aug 25, 2008 8:25 am

Trying carefully not to thread-jack here. ;-)

Not as bad or not the same thing. No pus, only water/serum (or similar). None had puffy eyes yesterday. Bubbles yesterday were minimal (though, when bubbles were present, they were always minimal). Bulging eyelids and bubbly eyes may have been two separate problems.

Appeared after I brought new birds into the pen without quarantine...BUT...those birds have been here three weeks and are all perfectly healthy, so even if I'd quarantined them for two weeks, they'd have been in there for a week now. If it was them, missed quarantine is irrelevant.

Stick fast fleas ... never had them. Sounds like I never want to. Hope Penola Poultry manages to find out what their problem is and can resolve it easily.

Penola Poultry · **Posted:** Mon Aug 25, 2008 8:51 am

I've never seen anything as bad as that eggsalive. However some time agoan old fellow gave me some of his ld breeders. I quaranteened and after a month put them in a run next to my other birds. Lo and behold, 3 days later my best Ancona cockerel had a massively swolen head and pussy eyes. He was so sick he was lying on his side. As he was a good bird and was going to be the core of my reeding season I took him to the vet. He was hospitalised, crop fed and given a massive dose of antibiotics. He did recouperate at a cost of $400!!!!! The vet diagnosed Fowl Cholera. Which is a form of respiratory disease in poultry. Gave me quite a scare.

Greenaus, Often minor eye problems are a symptom of one of the 3 common respiratory dieases especially symptoms like froth or bubbles. Antibiotics usually clears it quite quickly. I sometimes get it when the weather changes and there is a cold or windy snap.

The hen I have doesn't have any puss or froth, they are more like those raised moles you get (well that I have due to some sort of weird english/german cross).....they are on her eyelids. That's originally why I thought they may have been some sort of parasite.

greenaus · **Posted:** Mon Aug 25, 2008 8:59 am

Actually...I can't remember which came first so I could be wrong...the swollen eyes, puffiness and windy days coincided with the application of 2ml Ivomec on the back of the necks of each bird.

Maybe 2ml was too much...I doubt it though. I'm going with the wind.

Since I said that a day or two ago, I should use the past tense.

Gone with the Wind

:lol:

Penola Poultry · **Posted:** Mon Aug 25, 2008 9:04 am

actually i used cydectin once and my birds all lost every feather on their heads. I had lots of bald ugly birds. To this day I am not sure if I used too much or if the roosters were just over sexed!

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